Choosing your first AI coding setup

You need three things, and you probably already have one of them. A model. This is the thing doing the reasoning. Start with whatever is bundled into the tool you pick. Swapping models is a later optimisation, not a first decision. A place to work. Either an AI-native editor, or a CLI agent that edits files in a folder you already have. Editors are gentler if you have never used a terminal. CLI agents give you more rope. Somewhere to put it. A git repository, and a host that deploys from it. Do this on day one, before you have anything worth losing. The mistake to avoid is collecting tools. One editor, one model, one host, and something actually finished beats a bookmark folder of things you tried once.